Savin' Me

"Wakey wakey sugar cakey!" Darry cooed as he opened the door. I groaned and turned over, pulling the blanket over my head to block out his voice.

"No, that's not how this works," he rejected, yanking my blanket off me. I curled up into a ball and shivered a couple of times. "You have to answer me."

Instead of doing as he said, I looked over and glared at him. "What?"

"You have to repeat what I said back to you. That's how this works."

"No..."

"C'mon." Darry put on this huge and cheesy grin, reaching to rip my sheet off my bed. "You know you want to."

"I really don't." I turned over and put my pillow over my head. It was promptly stolen from me too, so I just stayed there in my little fetal position, trying to lure myself back into sleep.

"Wakey wakey sugar cakey!" he exclaimed again, right next to my ear. I grumbled something incoherent at him, hoping that would be a message to go away.

Instead, he repeated the words over and over and over and OVER again, and I was just about to jump out of bed and strangle him. I had no idea why someone would be annoying peppy to someone who was not a morning person. That was like joking around with a fully grown lion. Just not a smart thing to do.

"JUST SHUT UP ALREADY!" I screamed as loudly as I could at him.

Darry looked taken aback for a second before a slow grin spread across his face and said slowly and maniacally, "Wakey. Wakey. Sugar. Cakey."

"AHH!" I stood up and punched him in the stomach. Of course, since he was so muscular, he just smiled.

"Ha. You're up now, aren't you?"

"That...that was evil." He had won, and I didn't even realize that he had other motives. It made everything worse how I wasn't even tired anymore.

"You suck," I informed him. Darry walked out of the room without another word.

I got ready quickly and made my way downstairs. To my dismay, Ponyboy was already sitting at the table, eating a place of eggs and a piece of chocolate cake.

"I wanted to get ready before you," I sniffled, sitting down.

Darry put a plate in front of me, informing me, "He actually got up pretty easily this morning. I didn't have to pull the whole wakey wakey sugar cakey thing."

"You lucky bastard," I commented, picking up my fork. "And Darry, if you pull that again, I swear I'm going to rip out your throat."

"Aaand here come the threats." He raised an threatening eyebrow at me. "Now eat your food before you're late for school."

Obeying what he said, I mocked him silently, making Pony let out a little chuckle. "Stop that," Darry ordered without looking over at me.

'How did he know?' I mouthed to Ponyboy, but he just shrugged.

"DARRY!" Soda yelled, running into the kitchen in his boxer shorts. "Where are my jeans?!"

"In my closet," he replied. "Are you really just getting up?"

"Um..." Soda muttered before running back toward Darry's room without a real answer.

"Well articulated," I commented sarcastically, taking a sip from the cup in front of me.

"Oh, yeah..." Pony agreed with just as much sarcasm. "Anyway, we should probably go."

"I'll drive y'all. Soda's probably going to be a while." Darry offered.

I got up from the table, my chair scraping against the floor, and grabbed my bag from next to the door. When I went to sling it over my shoulder, I ended up smacking Ponyboy in the face, who was leaning down to grab his sneakers.

I tried to apologize in between bursts of laughter, but it wasn't working out too well. Pony just mumbled something that sounded like, "It's alright," but I couldn't be sure.

When we got to school, I called a thanks to Darry and slammed the door shut. "Hey," Pony's voice questioned, nodding somewhere to our right, "do you know her?"

Confused, I followed Pony's gaze to see Lily standing there, grinning widely. I knew her well enough to know that she was sizing up Pony. She was clearly going into prowl mode.

She seemed to notice that I was looking over at her, so she took it upon herself to walk up to us. "Hey, Zoe, babe."

Struggling to hold back a laugh at her weird behavior, I cocked an eyebrow at her. It went without her notice though, since her attention had already gone to Ponyboy. He looked extremely uncomfortable.

"Hi, sweetie. I'm Lily." She flipped her hair behind her shoulder and put on a subtle sultry look. "You're Peter, right?"

"Ponyboy..." he trailed off. "Not really a name that you can mix up..."

"Right, that's right. I just have a bad memory." She hit her head jokingly, as if she was trying to pass it off as a little mistake on her part. Seriously...how did she mix up Pony's name with someone else's...?

"So anyway!" Her voice continued an octave above her normal one and her aqua eyes sparkling. "I was just wondering if you wanted to hang out after school maybe? We could study or we could, um..." She looked him up and down quickly before finishing in a whisper, "do something else."

He gulped audibly and tried to cover it up by adjusting his backpack. "Um, I don't, uh..." With his gray eyes wide, he turned to face me, a clear call for help.

"We have to do the shopping after school, actually, Lils. He'll get back to your later." Then, not subtly at all, I grabbed Pony's arm and started dragging him away.

"Who the hell was that?!" he questioned fiercely, checking behind us quickly to make sure that she wasn't trailing behind. Then, he turned back to face me. He strangely looked like a really young child at that moment.

"She's my best friend, Lily."

"You're best friends wi-?!"

"I know, I know," I chuckled. "When she sees what she wants, she goes after it."

He puffed out his chest slightly, feeling kind of proud of himself. "She wants me?"

"Apparently, but don't let it go to your head. She probably figures that you'll go for her easily because she's a year ahead of you. Just...don't get caught up in her. I love the girl to death, but...she's kind of..." I bit my lip, thinking hard. "I don't know how to put this nicely... She comes on kind of strong."

"Strangely enough," he replied with an eye roll, "I got that."

The first bell rang, and we hurried down the hallway. "Just remember what I said!" I sing-songed as we walked into our first class.